ORIGINAL PAPER Investigating the potential of using environmental magnetism techniques as pollution proxy in urban road deposited sediment Environmental magnetism techniques as pollution proxy in urban road deposited sediment M. O. Kanu 1 • N. Basavaiah 2 • O. C. Meludu 3 • A. S. Oniku 3 Received: 17 November 2016 / Revised: 10 February 2017 / Accepted: 5 May 2017 Ó Islamic Azad University (IAU) 2017 Abstract The use of mineral magnetic techniques as pollution proxy for road deposited sediment was explored using various statistical approaches. Standard techniques were adopted for measurement of mineral magnetic and geochemical parameters. The analyses of magnetic parameters revealed that the samples were dominated by ferrimagnetic minerals and multidomain grains. This implied that the magnetic fractions in the samples might be of anthropogenic origin. Results also indicate that the samples were dominated by low coercive, magnetically soft minerals. Thermomagnetic curves confirmed mag- netite as the remanence bearing magnetic mineral having a Curie point temperature of *580 °C. The strong asso- ciation observed between magnetic susceptibility, sus- ceptibility of anhysteric remanent magnetization and saturation isothermal remanent magnetization and alu- minum, titanium, manganese, iron, chromium and lead demonstrated that these metals occurred as ferrimagnetic particles of technogenic origin resulting from vehicular sources. Assessment of pollution status of the road deposited sediment identified silicon and lead as the pri- ority pollutants of concern. Generally, pollution load index was \ 1 (mean, 0.66 ± 0.14), indicating that the samples were not polluted in the overall, but the metals were in the buildup stage requiring constant monitoring. The sources of pollutants from principal component and cluster analyses identified the sources of pollution to be mainly from vehicular emissions such as brake linings, exhaust materials, tire wear, corroded metal parts, abra- sion of lubricating oil and road construction materials. This study found that mineral magnetic techniques offer great potential as pollution proxy for soil pollution studies. Keywords Anthropogenic Á Environmental magnetism Á Geochemical Á Magnetic susceptibility Á Pollution Á Road deposited sediment Introduction Road deposited sediments (RDS) are particulates accu- mulated on pavements and road surfaces in urban envi- ronments (Carraz et al. 2006). They are a complex mix of particulates and contaminants derived from extensive range of urban and industrial sources and processes and hence important pathway for urban pollution. Sources of RDS are either anthropogenic in nature (vehicle exhaust emissions, vehicle tire and body wear, brake lining material, road paint, building and construction material, pedestrian deb- ris) or naturally derived (soil material, plant and leaf litter, and atmospheric deposition) (Robertson et al. 2003; Carraz et al. 2006; Reis et al. 2014). According to Crosby et al. (2014), RDS has potential to reflect historical episodes of anthropogenic activity, including traffic movements, industrial and urban processes, attracting considerable research attention. In several studies, RDS has been used as a medium to estimate pollution and particulate matter Editorial responsibility: M. Abbaspour. & M. O. Kanu maxwell.kanu@tsuniversity.edu.ng 1 Department of Physics, Taraba State University, P. M. B. 1167, Jalingo, Taraba State, Nigeria 2 Environmental Magnetism Laboratory, Indian Institute of Geomagnetism, Kalomboli Highway, Navi-Mumbai, Mumbai 410 218, India 3 Department of Physics, Modibbo Adama University of Technology, P. M. B. 2076, Yola, Adamawa State, Nigeria 123 Int. J. Environ. Sci. Technol. DOI 10.1007/s13762-017-1356-5